NATO’s second-in-command says Russia is now an enemy, not a partner

NATO Deputy Secretary General Alexander Vershbow now says that the allied group has been compelled to treat Russia “as more of an enemy than a partner,” according to an Associated Press report published Thursday.

The 61-year-old former United States ambassador to Russia
reportedly told journalists this week that Moscow’s role in the
ongoing crisis in Ukraine has forced NATO to reconsider the
alliance’s opinion on Russia, and that additional troops may soon
be mobilized to the region as tensions worsen.

AP journalist Robert Burns wrote on Thursday that Vershbow said the
Kremlin’s perceived part in the recent events in Ukraine
“marks a turning point in decades of effort by NATO to draw
Moscow closer.”

NATO’s second-in-command reportedly told journalists that the
alliance is now considering new measures meant to counter any
future acts of aggression on the part of Russia aimed at partner
nations, and soon could deploy a larger number of combat forces
to Eastern Europe.

Journalists reporting for Civil.Ge wrote on Thursday that Vershbow told the
audience at a panel discussion in Washington, DC one day earlier
that NATO should deploy “defensive assets to the
region.”

“We need to step up our support for defense reforms and
military modernization of Russia’s neighbors, and not just of
Ukraine, but also Moldova, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan,”
Vershbow said, according to the Civil Georgia site.

NATO should think about “upgrading” joint exercises
among partner nations, the site quoted Vershbow as saying during
the event, while acknowledging that deploying forces to Georgia
would be a “controversial” maneuver.

“It is also important for the United States to show
leadership… to make sure that next steps that NATO will make, for
example at the summit in September, will be adequate response to
what’s happening in Ukraine,” the Georgian Defense Minister
Irakli Alasania said during the discussion.

“The West should now seize the opportunity and create the
reality on the ground by accepting membership of aspirant
countries, by putting purely defensive assets in aspirant
countries and predominantly in Georgia,” Alasania added.
“What is important now is to put some deterrent capabilities
on the ground like air defense and anti-armor capabilities that
will give us a chance to defend our freedom, because we know that
if things go wrong at this point no one is coming to save us;
we’ve seen that in 2008.”

Earlier this week, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said
the builduip of NATO troops near Russia’s border was “unprecedented.” Weeks earlier, the US Air
Force commander in charge of NATO’s military presence in Europe
said that US troops may soon be deployed to the region as tensions continue to
worsen near the border between Ukraine and Russia.

For weeks now, officials in Washington and Kiev have claimed that
the recent separation of Crimea from Ukraine and the rash of
uprisings in the country’s eastern part are the direct result of
destabilization efforts spearheaded by Moscow, and both the US
and European Union have introduced several rounds of sanctions
against Russia as a result. The Kremlin has refuted these claims
and rebuffed the sanctions, however, and earlier this week
Russian Pres. Vladimir Putin accused the White House of orchestrating the
Ukrainian crisis.

“I think what is happening now shows us who really was
mastering the process from the beginning. But in the beginning,
the United States preferred to remain in the shadow,” Putin
said this week.